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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 1,099 records · Page 61
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2018

Potential of Wind Power to Provide Flexible Ramping Products and Operating Reserve: Preprint

With increasing penetration levels of variable renewable energy sources, such as wind and solar, electric power systems need flexible resources that can provide fast-response ramping capabilities to counter the variability and uncertainty of renewable generation. Although the California Independent System Operator and Midcontinent System Operator have lauched ramp products, determining how wind power can participate using their flexible ramping models is still largely unclear. This paper proposes a security-constrained unit commitment (SCUC) model considering a flexible ramping constraint representing the system's flexible ramping requirements that account for the net load probabilistic forecast uncertainty. Through this explicit modeling of the uncertainty, the true cost of the flexible ramp service can be determined after solving the SCUC problem. In addition, the potential of wind power to provide operating reserves is analyzed. Numerical case studies demonstrate that with wind power providing both flexible ramping products and operating reserve, the system operating costs and ramp shortages will be reduced significantly.

17 WIND ENERGY↗
DOE OSTI2013

Energy valuation methods for biofuels in South Florida: Introduction to life cycle assessment and emergy approaches

Here, recent changes in the United States requiring the use of ethanol in gasoline for most vehicular transportation have created discussion about important issues, such as shifting the use of certain plants from food production to energy supply, related federal subsidies, effects on soil, water and atmosphere resources, tradeoffs between food production and energy production, speculation about biofuels as a possible means for energy security, potential reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions or development and expansion of biofuels industry. A sustainable approach to biofuel production requires understanding inputs (i.e., energy required to carry out a process, both natural and anthropogenic) and outputs (i.e., energy produced by that process) and cover the entire process, as well as environmental considerations that can be overlooked in a more traditional approach. This publication gives an overview of two methods for evaluating energy transformations in biofuels production: (1) Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and (2) Emergy Assessment (EA). The LCA approach involves measurements affecting greenhouse gases (GHG), which can be linked to the energy considerations used in the EA. Although these two methods have their basis in energy or GHG evaluations, their approaches can lead to a reliable judgment regarding a biofuel process. Using these two methods can ensure that the energy components are well understood and can help to evaluate the economic environmental component of a biofuel process. In turn, using these two evaluative tools will allow for decisions about biofuel processes that favor sustainability

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Fiscal Year 2020 Annual Summary Report for the Area 3 and Area 5 Radioactive Waste Management Sites at the Nevada National Security Site, Nye County, Nevada

U.S. Department of Energy Standard DOE-STD-5002-2017, “Disposal Authorization Statement and Tank Closure Documentation,” requires preparation of an Annual Summary Report comparing low-level radioactive waste disposal facilities operations with the Disposal Authorization Statement (DAS) and its supporting technical documents including the performance assessment (PA) and the composite analysis (CA). The fiscal year (FY) 2020 Annual Summary Report for the Area 3 and Area 5 Radioactive Waste Management Sites (RWMSs) was prepared by reviewing planned and discovered changes, waste receipts, monitoring results, research and development (R&D) results, and the status of DAS conditions and issues to assess the validity of the DASs, PAs, and CAs.

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗
NASA NTRS2008

Energy and Water Management

Energy efficiency isn't just a good idea; it's a necessity, both for cost reasons and to meet federal regulatory requirements. First, rising energy unit costs continue to erode NASA's mission budget. NASA spent roughly $156M on facility energy in FY 2007. Although that represents less than one per cent of NASA's overall annual budget, the upward trend in energy costs concerns the agency. While NASA reduced consumption 13%, energy unit costs have risen 63%. Energy cost increases counteract the effects of energy conservation, which results in NASA buying less yet spending more. The second factor is federal energy legislation. The National Energy Conservation Policy Act, as amended by the Energy Policy Act of 2005, Executive Order (EO) 13423 (January, 2007), and the Energy Independence and Security Act (December, 2007), mandates energy/water conservation goals for all federal agencies, including NASA. There are also reporting requirements associated with this legislation. The Energy/Water Management Task was created to support NASA Headquarters Environmental Management Division (HO EMD) in meeting these requirements. With assistance from TEERM, HQ EMD compiled and submitted the NASA Annual Report to the Department of Energy FY 2007. The report contains information on how NASA is meeting federally mandated energy and water management goals. TEERM monitored input for timeliness, errors, and conformity to the new energy/water reporting guidelines and helped compile the information into the final report. TEERM also assists NASA Energy/Water Management with proposal and award calls, updates to the energy/water management database, and facilitating communication within the energy/water management community. TEERM is also supporting NASA and the Interagency Working Group (IWG) on Hydrogen and Fuel Cells. Established shortly after the President announced the Hydrogen Fuel Initiative in 2003, this IWG serves as the mechanism for collaboration among the Federal agencies involved in hydrogen-related research, development, and demonstration. TEERM developed a matrix showing all Hydrogen and Fuel Cell activities from the various NASA centers to be included in the Group's extensive hydrogen research taxonomy of past, present, and future hydrogen activities of the Federal government.

Valek, Susan E.↗
DOE OSTI2020

Secure and Cost-Effective Micro Phasor Measurement Unit (PMU)-Like Metering for Behind-the-Meter (BTM) Solar Systems using Blockchain-Assisted Smart Inverters

Recently, there is increasing interest in using behind-the-meter (BTM) solar systems for grid services. However, providing visibility and operational situational awareness of BTM solar systems mainly operated by small-scale solar inverters is challenging due to the requirement of relatively expansive networked observation tools (e.g., micro phasor measurement units (µPMUs)) and consequent cybersecurity threats through networks. This paper presents a secure, cost-effective, µPMUs-like metering method using a blockchain-assisted smart (BAS) inverters for a BTM solar system. The proposed BAS inverter consisting of an internet of things device as a node of a local blockchain network enables the secure provision of inverter measurement data for grid services. The BAS inverter sends the encrypted local measurement data with a timestamp to a local blockchain miner. Once the blockchain miner generates a tamper-resistant metering ledger including the measurements, it is used to assess the situational awareness of the BTM solar system. The concept of the proposed metering using the BAS inverters is validated by experimental studies.

behind the meter↗
DOE OSTI2013

Large-Scale Data Challenges in Future Power Grids

This paper describes technical challenges in supporting large-scale real-time data analysis for future power grid systems and discusses various design options to address these challenges. Even though the existing U.S. power grid has served the nation remarkably well over the last 120 years, big changes are in the horizon. The widespread deployment of renewable generation, smart grid controls, energy storage, plug-in hybrids, and new conducting materials will require fundamental changes in the operational concepts and principal components. The whole system becomes highly dynamic and needs constant adjustments based on real time data. Even though millions of sensors such as phase measurement units (PMUs) and smart meters are being widely deployed, a data layer that can support this amount of data in real time is needed. Unlike the data fabric in cloud services, the data layer for smart grids must address some unique challenges. This layer must be scalable to support millions of sensors and a large number of diverse applications and still provide real time guarantees. Moreover, the system needs to be highly reliable and highly secure because the power grid is a critical piece of infrastructure. No existing systems can satisfy all the requirements at the same time. We examine various design options. In particular, we explore the special characteristics of power grid data to meet both scalability and quality of service requirements. Our initial prototype can improve performance by orders of magnitude over existing general-purpose systems. The prototype was demonstrated with several use cases from PNNL’s FPGI and was shown to be able to integrate huge amount of data from a large number of sensors and a diverse set of applications.

Smart Grid, Real Time, Commercial Products, Big Da↗
DOE OSTI2020

Secure and Cost-Effective Micro Phasor Measurement Unit (PMU)-Like Metering for Behind-the-Meter (BTM) Solar Systems Using Blockchain-Assisted Smart Inverters: Preprint

Recently, there is increasing interest in using behind-the-meter (BTM) solar systems for grid services. However, providing visibility and operational situational awareness of BTM solar systems mainly operated by small-scale solar inverters is challenging due to the requirement of relatively expansive networked observation tools (e.g., micro phasor measurement units (uPMUs)) and consequent cybersecurity threats through networks. This paper presents a secure, cost-effective, uPMUs-like metering method using a blockchain-assisted smart (BAS) inverters for a BTM solar system. The proposed BAS inverter consisting of an internet-of-things device as a node of a local blockchain network enables the secure provision of inverter measurement data for grid services. The BAS inverter sends the encrypted local measurement data with a timestamp to a local blockchain miner. Once the blockchain miner generates a tamper-resistant metering ledger including the measurements, it is used to assess the situational awareness of the BTM solar system. The concept of the proposed metering using the BAS inverters is validated by experimental studies.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗
DOE OSTI2022

Feasibility of critical infrastructure protection using network functions for programmable and decoupled ICS policy enforcement over WAN

Industrial control systems (ICS) represent a major component of our critical infrastructure. With the increasing need for more control and monitoring of such systems, ICS have seen an increase in connectivity to wide area networks (WAN) exposing aging equipment to rapidly evolving cybersecurity threats. Furthermore, the ICS data requires a reliability measure from the networks for critical functions for infrastructure monitoring and control. Especially when remote plant sites are involved such as pipelines, energy distribution networks, and transportation, WAN transport impairments most often provide a best effort delivery with no strict reliability guarantees. Network functions can provide a vendor agnostic, programmable critical infrastructure protection with a single maintenance, policy determination, and reliability assurance surface. A network function (NF) can be utilized for policy enforcement over the communication between remote entities and the main control office. This paper presents the research on transparent integration with existing ICS without disrupting communications, resulting in minimal downtime while decoupling the fast paced evolution of defensive security measures from the upgrade cycle of expensive long term hardware. We report our measurements on the resource requirements and overhead in the network for successful NF insertion under a wide variety of network impairments (network packet delay, reordering, and loss). Our paired NF implementation provides a policy enforcement platform extensible to cover myriad cybersecurity-related communication goals, including packet signing for verification, encryption for data privacy, packet filtering and data diode operation (i.e. protecting against eavesdropping, packet injection, and denial-of-service). Furthermore, bundling communication specifications into packet flows allows for tunability in applying policies as coarse- or fine-grained as the needs of the operator. We report on network function resource requirements in the form of required queue depth and network utilization overhead to inform the decision making against hardware cost constraints.

42 ENGINEERING↗
NASA NTRS2018

Reliable and Secure Surveillance, Communications and Navigation (RSCAN) for Unmanned Air Systems (UAS) in Controlled Airspace

The aviation industry faces a rapidly-emerging need for integrating Unmanned Air Systems (UAS) into the national airspace (NAS). This trend will present challenging questions for the safe operation of UAS in controlled and uncontrolled airspaces based on new Communications, Navigation and Surveillance (CNS) technologies. For example, can wireless communications data links provide the necessary capacity for accommodating ever increasing numbers of UAS worldwide? Does the communications network provide ample Internet Protocol (IP) address space to allow Air Traffic Control (ATC) to securely address each UAS? Can navigation and surveillance approaches assure safe route planning and safe separation of vehicles even in crowded skies?Under NASA contract NNA16BD84C, Boeing is developing an integrated CNS architecture to enable UAS operations in the NAS. Revolutionary and advanced CNS alternatives are needed to support UAS operations at all altitudes and in all airspaces, including both controlled and uncontrolled. These CNS alternatives must be reliable, redundant, always available, cyber-secure, and affordable for all types of vehicles including small UAS to large transport category aircraft. Our approach considers CNS requirements that address the range of UAS missions where they will be most beneficial and cost-effective.A cybersecure future UAS CNS architecture is needed to support the NASA vision for an Unmanned Air Traffic Management (UTM) system in uncontrolled airspace and a cooperative operation of manned and unmanned aircraft in the controlled global Air Traffic Management (ATM) system. The architecture must, therefore, support always-available and cyber secure operations. This paper presents UAS CNS architecture concepts for large UAS operating in the ATM system in controlled airspace. Future companion works will consider small UAS operating in the UTM system in uncontrolled airspace.

Ponchak, Denise S.↗
DOE OSTI2012

Transducer Signal Noise Analysis for Sensor Authentication

The abstract is being passed through STIMS for submision to the conference. International safeguards organizations charged with promoting the peaceful use of nuclear energy employ unattended and remote monitoring systems supplemented with onsite inspections to ensure nuclear materials are not diverted for weaponization purposes. These systems are left unattended for periods of several months between inspections. During these periods physical security means are the main deterrent used to detect intentional monitoring system tampering. The information gathering components are locked in secure and sealed rooms. The sensor components (i.e. neutron and gamma detectors) are located throughout the plant in unsecure areas where sensor tampering could take place during the periods between inspections. Sensor tampering could allow the diversion of nuclear materials from the accepted and intended use to uses not consistent with the peaceful use of nuclear energy. A method and an apparatus is presented that address the detection of sensor tampering during the periods between inspections. It was developed at the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) for the Department of Energy (DOE) in support of the IAEA. The method is based on the detailed analysis of the sensor noise floor after the sensor signal is removed. The apparatus consists of a 2.1” x 2.6” electronic circuit board containing all signal conditioning and processing components and a laptop computer running an application that acquires and stores the analysis results between inspection periods. The sensors do not require any modification and are remotely located in their normal high radiation zones. The apparatus interfaces with the sensor signal conductors using a simple pass through connector at the normal sensor electronics interface package located in the already secure and sealed rooms. The apparatus does not require hardening against the effects of radiation due to its location. Presented is the apparatus design, the analysis method, and the test results as applied to tamper detection using three HE3 neutron sensors and two gamma sensors designed and built for safeguards monitoring.

98 NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT, SAFEGUARDS, AND PHYSICAL P↗
DOE OSTI2021

Commonly Overlooked Material Attractiveness Issues [Slides]

SG-Pu, WG-Pu, FG-Pu, RG-Pu, HEU, and Np should not be ignored in safeguards or security discussions: Nation states prefer SG-Pu and WG-Pu for missile delivery. Terrorists and some nation states will prefer FG-Pu and RG-Pu to minimize the mass that must be stolen/diverted and to minimize the risk of detection. Terrorists and some nation states will prefer HEU to eliminate the need for testing. A nation state with reprocessing capabilities might prefer 237 Np because the IAEA doesn’t require it to be safeguarded. Terrorists might prefer 237 Np if the nation state does not provide adequate safeguards and security for it.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2011

ULTRA SECURE HIGH RELIABILITY WIRELESS RADIATION MONITOR

Radiation monitoring in nuclear facilities is essential to safe operation of the equipment as well as protecting personnel. In specific, typical air monitoring of radioactive gases or particulate involves complex systems of valves, pumps, piping and electronics. The challenge is to measure a representative sample in areas that are radioactively contaminated. Running cables and piping to these locations is very expensive due to the containment requirements. Penetration into and out of an airborne or containment area is complex and costly. The process rooms are built with thick rebar-enforced concrete walls with glove box containment chambers inside. Figure 1 shows high temperature radiation resistance cabling entering the top of a typical glove box. In some case, the entire processing area must be contained in a 'hot cell' where the only access into the chamber is via manipulators. An example is shown in Figure 2. A short range wireless network provides an ideal communication link for transmitting the data from the radiation sensor to a 'clean area', or area absent of any radiation fields or radioactive contamination. Radiation monitoring systems that protect personnel and equipment must meet stringent codes and standards due to the consequences of failure. At first glance a wired system would seem more desirable. Concerns with wireless communication include latency, jamming, spoofing, man in the middle attacks, and hacking. The Department of Energy's Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) has developed a prototype wireless radiation air monitoring system that address many of the concerns with wireless and allows quick deployment in radiation and contamination areas. It is stand alone and only requires a standard 120 VAC, 60 Hz power source. It is designed to be mounted or portable. The wireless link uses a National Security Agency (NSA) Suite B compliant wireless network from Fortress Technologies that is considered robust enough to be used for classified data transmission in place of NSA Type 1 devices.

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS↗
DOE OSTI2014

Where Big Data and Prediction Meet

Our ability to assemble and analyze massive data sets, often referred to under the title of “big data”, is an increasingly important tool for shaping national policy. This in turn has introduced issues from privacy concerns to cyber security. But as IBM’s John Kelly emphasized in the last Innovation, making sense of the vast arrays of data will require radically new computing tools. In the past, technologies and tools for analysis of big data were viewed as quite different from the traditional realm of high performance computing (HPC) with its huge models of phenomena such as global climate or supporting the nuclear test moratorium. Looking ahead, this will change with very positive benefits for both worlds. Societal issues such as global security, economic planning and genetic analysis demand increased understanding that goes beyond existing data analysis and reduction. The modeling world often produces simulations that are complex compositions of mathematical models and experimental data. This has resulted in outstanding successes such as the annual assessment of the state of the US nuclear weapons stockpile without underground nuclear testing. Ironically, while there were historically many test conducted, this body of data provides only modest insight into the underlying physics of the system. A great deal of emphasis was thus placed on the level of confidence we can develop for the predictions. As data analytics and simulation come together, there is a growing need to assess the confidence levels in both data being gathered and the complex models used to make predictions. An example of this is assuring the security or optimizing the performance of critical infrastructure systems such as the power grid. If one wants to understand the vulnerabilities of the system or impacts of predicted threats, full scales tests of the grid against threat scenarios are unlikely. Preventive measures would need to be predicated on well-defined margins of confidence in order to take mitigating actions that could have wide ranging impacts. There is a rich opportunity for interaction and exchange between the HPC simulation and data analytics communities.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
NASA NTRS2020

Design and Testing of an Ultra-Light Weight Perching System for Sloped or Vertical Rough Surfaces on Mars

In this paper, we present the design, characterization, and functional demonstration of a perching system that enables a flying vehicle to land on rough sloped or vertical surfaces. Steep slopes are of particular scientific interest since they are often associated with geologically interesting features including sites of active modification (e.g. landslides/avalanches, slope streaks), exposed bedrock and/or ice, and as-yet unmodified young features (e.g. walls of fresh craters or polar pits that are actively expanding). However the steep nature of these sites makes access with traditional field robots difficult: ground vehicles are unable to traverse the steep terrain and aerial vehicles are limited by their flight time and an ability to operate near terrain. We propose to address these limitation by enabling the UAV to reliably perch on steep terrain to perform in situ measurements and collect samples. Perching also enables a solar powered UAV to traverse large terrain features such as the Valles Marineris that could not be covered in a single flight by repeatedly perching and recharging its batteries. The proposed perching system that is being developed consists of a microspine gripper, a compliant gripper to vehicle interface, and a flying vehicle equipped with an autonomy sensor suite. The system also includes perception and control algorithms that identify perching targets and execute the required perching maneuver. To date, the majority of the effort has focused on developing and characterizing the microspine gripper. The initial prototype weighs 100 g, is capable of securely grasping a range of natural surfaces, and successful grasps support loads of over 10 N. Refinement of the gripper, integrating and testing it on a UAV, measuring aerodynamic distrubances from wall effects, and developing the required perception and control algorithms is ongoing. This paper describes the overall architecture of our proposed system, the design of the gripper, and its performance during initial testing.

Backus, Spencer↗
NASA NTRS2008

Remote Sensing for Food Security Monitoring in Afghanistan

Two decades of war have severely weakened Afghanistan s economy and infrastructure. Along with larger impacts on civil stability, education and health care, the current conflict in Afghanistan has resulted in widespread hunger and destitution. The 2005 National Risk and Vulnerability Assessment conducted by the United Nations found that 6.6 million Afghans do not meet their minimum food requirements and approximately 400,000 people each year are seriously affected by natural disasters, such as droughts, floods and extreme weather conditions. Given the poor security situation in the country, systems that will enable remote observations of variations of climate and their impacts on food production are critical for providing an appropriate and timely response. This chapter describes the remote sensing systems and food security analyses that the US Agency for International Development s Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET) conducts in Afghanistan to monitor and provide information to international donors to ensure that adequate assistance is provided during this time of development and recovery.

Brown, Molly E.↗
DOE OSTI2016

The SDSS-IV extended baryon oscillation spectroscopic survey: Luminous red galaxy target selection

Here, we describe the algorithm used to select the luminous red galaxy (LRG) sample for the extended Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (eBOSS) of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey IV (SDSS-IV) using photometric data from both the SDSS and the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer. LRG targets are required to meet a set of color selection criteria and have z-band and i-band MODEL magnitudes z < 19.95 and 19.9 < i < 21.8, respectively. Our algorithm selects roughly 50 LRG targets per square degree, the great majority of which lie in the redshift range 0.6 < z < 1.0 (median redshift 0.71). We also demonstrate that our methods are highly effective at eliminating stellar contamination and lower-redshift galaxies. We perform a number of tests using spectroscopic data from SDSS-III/BOSS ancillary programs to determine the redshift reliability of our target selection and its ability to meet the science requirements of eBOSS. The SDSS spectra are of high enough signal-to-noise ratio that at least ~89% of the target sample yields secure redshift measurements. Finally, we present tests of the uniformity and homogeneity of the sample, demonstrating that it should be clean enough for studies of the large-scale structure of the universe at higher redshifts than SDSS-III/BOSS LRGs reached.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
NASA NTRS2017

Requirements for an Integrated UAS CNS Architecture

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Glenn Research Center (GRC) is investigating revolutionary and advanced universal, reliable, always available, cyber secure and affordable Communication, Navigation, Surveillance (CNS) options for all altitudes of UAS operations. In Spring 2015, NASA issued a Call for Proposals under NASA Research Announcements (NRA) NNH15ZEA001N, Amendment 7 Subtopic 2.4. Boeing was selected to conduct a study with the objective to determine the most promising candidate technologies for Unmanned Air Systems (UAS) air-to-air and air-to-ground data exchange and analyze their suitability in a post-NextGen NAS environment. The overall objectives are to develop UAS CNS requirements and then develop architectures that satisfy the requirements for UAS in both controlled and uncontrolled air space. This contract is funded under NASAs Aeronautics Research Mission Directorates (ARMD) Aviation Operations and Safety Program (AOSP) Safe Autonomous Systems Operations (SASO) project and proposes technologies for the Unmanned Air Systems Traffic Management (UTM) service. Communications, Navigation and Surveillance (CNS) requirements must be developed in order to establish a CNS architecture supporting Unmanned Air Systems integration in the National Air Space (UAS in the NAS). These requirements must address cybersecurity, future communications, satellite-based navigation APNT, and scalable surveillance and situational awareness. CNS integration, consolidation and miniaturization requirements are also important to support the explosive growth in small UAS deployment. Air Traffic Management (ATM) must also be accommodated to support critical Command and Control (C2) for Air Traffic Controllers (ATC). This document therefore presents UAS CNS requirements that will guide the architecture.

Templin, Fred↗
DOE OSTI2026

Building Nuclear-Specific Cybersecurity Expertise in Higher Education

The rapid digitalization of nuclear power plants (NPPs) and the deployment of advanced and small modular reactors (A/SMRs) have expanded the cybersecurity attack surface within the nuclear sector. This evolution introduces unique challenges beyond those faced in general information technology (IT), operational technology (OT) and industrial control system (ICS) security, due to nuclear power’s regulatory rigor, safety-critical nature, and operational needs. A pressing workforce gap persists; cybersecurity graduates typically lack nuclear-specific context and retraining them for industry readiness requires 12–18 months, creating a significant burden. This paper addresses this gap by defining the domains of knowledge that nuclear cybersecurity specialists must master, spanning cybersecurity, nuclear engineering, OT/ICS security, and regulatory governance. We propose a curricular framework integrating technical, regulatory, and applied learning components to accelerate workforce readiness. Our approach builds on existing findings that current curricula inadequately integrate nuclear engineering and cybersecurity, shifting the discourse from why specialization is needed to what knowledge must be taught. The recommendations have implications for workforce development and long-term resilience of the nuclear energy sector.

99 - GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS↗